Dan McNeil's Blog

So I read in the papers today that Led Zep are to go on tour, but without Robert Plant. But without Robert Plant it's not Led Zep is it? Which brings me onto another of my favourite pet hates - Queen and Paul Rogers. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of Brian May, Roger Taylor and even Paul Rogers. But if you put the three of them together, you do not get "Queen plus" anything. You get Brian May, Roger Taylor and Paul Rogers. I've heard Brian May say online many times that he's not really interested in touring for the money. That's cool. And that he enjoys playing the old Queen songs - that is also cool. But if both of those things are true, then why not tour as "Brian May, Roger Taylor with Paul Rogers". You can still play the songs, but may not sell quite as many tickets. But if money isn't the reason, then surely that wouldn't matter to them. In a way, I'm disappointed. At first, the idea of getting Paul Rogers t...

I read today in the news that a train company here in the UK plans to coat the windows of trains in a special material which stops mobile signals being received inside the carriage. I've never understood the fascination people have with describing mobile phones being used in public as "a nuisance". Why is someone talking into a phone any more annoying than two people talking to each other. If the problem were one of noise levels, I would think it should be only the half problem, surely? I think the problem is more one of frustration at not hearing the other side of the conversation. I don't mean that flippantly; I actually mean it deadly seriously. I think the same thing happens when overhearing the conversation in a language we don't understand ourselves. I'm not sure we necessarily get frustrated at not hearing the conversation; moreso I think we have an internal frustration that what we are hearing is "noise" rather than "human conversati...

I really should spellcheck things before I put them online. Although, the typo I can spot in the first line of the previous post would not have been caught by a spellchecker anyway. Maybe I should leave the mistakes in as a way of checking if anyone is copying my work. I know that the phone book in the UK used to have fake numbers and names in, and if those fake numbers and names appeared in another directory, then the publishers of the phone book would know that the other people had copied the list from the phone book. The same thing is often true with sheet music. There are generally a couple of deliberate mistakes per song which don't affect the accuracy of the music in any significant way, but do allow the publishers to uniquely identify their work. So maybe I should do the same thing with this blog. I should inject a few deliberate mistakes into it so that if any of my wonderful and witty words (should I ever write anyone) appear elsewhere, I shall able to sue and make mil...

It's a funny old thing, blogging. Except it's not that told. Nor, generally, are blogs funny - especially those which are meant to be. Anyway, in the past I've tried and failed to maintain a blog. Maybe some of you even read one of them. I doubt it. Noone did. But I guess that's the point with blogs isn't it? I'm not writing it for you to read, nor am I writing it for me to read. I'm writing it because I can. So, as yet I have absolutely no idea what I shall put into my blog, but time will shape that, I'm sure. On the internet, I think there's a choice to be made. You can either put a picture of yourself, some contact details and then write a blog. But if you choose to do this, you accept that anyone who knows you could potentially find your blog and read everything you've written. And "anyone" could include "grandmother" "family of your partner" or "the Queen" so one has to watch one's langu...

Here I go again. Once more, I'm going to try to sustain a blog... Let's see how it goes...